Gov. Bob. Taylors Tales

Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales, by Robert L. Taylor

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Title: Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales
Author: Robert L. Taylor
Release Date: December 23, 2006 [EBook #20171]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[Illustration]

Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales.
"THE FIDDLE AND THE BOW,"
"THE PARADISE OF FOOLS",
"VISIONS AND DREAMS."
ILLUSTRATED.
Published by DeLONG RICE & COMPANY. Nashville, Tenn.

COPYRIGHTED, 1896. All rights reserved by DeLong Rice & Co.
UNIVERSITY PRESS CO., NASHVILLE, TENN.

PREFACE.
This volume presents the first publication of the famous lectures of Governor Robert L. Taylor. His great popularity as an orator and entertainer, and his wide reputation as a humorist, have caused repeated inquiries from all sections of the country for his lectures in book form; and this has given rise to an earlier publication than was expected.
The lectures are given without the slightest abridgment, just as delivered from the platform throughout the country. The consecutive chain of each is left undisturbed; and the idea of paragraphing, and giving headlines to the various subjects treated, was conceived merely for the convenience of the reader.
In the dialect of his characters, the melody of his songs, and the originality of his quaint, but beautiful conceptions, Governor Taylor's lectures are temples of thought, lighted with windows of fun.
DELONG RICE.

Temples of Thought, Lighted with Windows Of Fun.

CONTENTS.
"THE FIDDLE AND THE BOW." 9 Cherish the Little Ones 19 Fat Men and Bald-Headed Men 22 The Poet Laureate of Music 23 The Convict and His Fiddle 25 A Vision of The Old Field School 27 The Quilting and the Old Virginia Reel 36 The Candy Pulling 44 The Banquet 48 There is Music All Around Us 53 The Two Columns. 61 There is a Melody for Every Ear 63 Music is the Wine of the Soul 66 The Old Time Singing School 72 The Grand Opera 78 Music 80
"THE PARADISE OF FOOLS." 83 The Paradise of Childhood 90 The Paradise of the Barefooted Boy 98 The Paradise of Youth 104 The Paradise of Home 112 Bachelor and Widower 117 Phantoms 119 The False Ideal 121 The Circus in the Mountains 123 The Phantom of Fortune 128 Clocks 130 The Panic 133 Bunk City 135 Your Uncle 137 Fools 140 Blotted Pictures 143
"VISIONS AND DREAMS." 147 The Happy Long Ago 151 Dreams of the Years to Come 160 From the Cave-man to the Kiss-o-phone 169 Dreams 175 Visions of Departed Glory 178 Nature's Musicians 181 Preacher's Paradise 185 Brother Estep and the Trumpet 189 "Wamper-jaw" at the Jollification 190 The Tintinnabulation of the Dinner Bells 193 Phantoms of the Wine Cup 196 The Missing Link 197 Nightmare 198 Infidelity 200 The Dream of God 201

"THE FIDDLE AND THE BOW."
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I heard a great master play on the wondrous violin; his bow quivered like the wing of a bird; in every quiver there was a melody, and every melody breathed a thought in language sweeter than was ever uttered by human tongue. I was conjured, I was mesmerized by his music. I thought I fell asleep under its power, and was rapt into the realm of visions and dreams. The enchanted violin broke out in tumult, and through the rifted shadows in my dream I thought I saw old ocean lashed to fury. The wing of the storm-god brooded above it, dark and lowering with night and tempest and war. I heard the shriek of the angry hurricane, the loud rattling musketry of rain, and hail, and the louder and deadlier crash and roar of the red artillery on high. Its rumbling batteries, unlimbered on the vapory heights and manned by the fiery gunners of the storm, boomed their volleying thunders to the terrible rythm of the strife below. And in every stroke of the bow fierce lightnings leaped down from their dark pavilions of cloud, and, like armed angels of light, flashed their trenchant blades among the phantom squadrons marshalling for battle on the field of the deep. I heard the bugle blast and battle cry of the charging winds, wild and exultant, and then I saw the billowy monsters rise, like an army of Titans, to scale and carry the hostile heights of heaven. Assailing again and again, as often hurled back headlong into the ocean's abyss, they rolled, and surged, and writhed, and raged, till the affrighted earth trembled at the uproar of the warring elements. I saw